MEDIABLAB DAILY DIGEST APRIL 18: JAPANESE EXECUTION TAPE BROADCAST; UK BROADBAND IN SEWERS;
April 18th 2008 03:16
REUTERS CAMERAMAN KILLED IN GAZA EXPLOSION
Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana was killed in Gaza in an explosion which also claimed the lives of two bystanders.
Shana, 23, was travelling in a car that had stopped and was killed in an explosion as he was getting out of it, Reuters said. A Reuters soundman, Wafa Abu Mizyed, also travelling in the vehicle escaped serious injury.
The cameraman, who had worked for the news agency in the region for more than three years, is the first Reuters journalist to be killed in Gaza.
Shana, a Palestinian, had previously been wounded in August 2006 when an Israeli aircraft fired a missile at the vehicle he was travelling in.
UK MEDIA REGULATOR RECOMMENDS RUNNING BROADBAND CABLES THROUGH SEWERS TO COPE WITH DEMAND
Media regulator Ofcom suggest that putting broadband cables in sewers could help cope with the soaring demand for online video content in the UK.
The idea, already embraced in European cities including Paris, was floated by Ofcom chief executive Ed Richards as part of a survey that will be carried out of the UK's existing underground telecoms infrastructure.
The Guardians said that Ofcom sees the development of nationwide superfast broadband of up to 100MB as essential in keeping the UK up with global digital leaders such as Korea, Japan, France and Germany.
The communications regulator's figures show the actual average speed across the existing UK broadband network was 4.6MB per second last summer, compared with advertised download speeds in Japan of more than 90MB per second and in Korea of 43MB.
Turnover at News Group Newspapers in Britain, the publisher of the Sun and the News of the World, fell by 20 million pounds (A$42 million) last year.
The Guardian reports this was mostly due to falling sales of newspapers and its price-cutting campaign in Scotland.
News Group, a subsidiary of News International, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation media empire, generated turnover of 623.3 million pounds in the year to the end of June 2007.
This was a 3 percent decline on the previous year.
Although the Sun and the News of the World remain market leaders in their sectors, their sales are declining steadily.
In June 2007, the last month of News Group's financial year, the Sun's average sale was 3,064,376, a decline of 2.7 percent on the previous year; while the News of the World posted 3,269,483, a year-on-year fall of 5.8 percent.
The Sun also saw its revenues hit by a cost-cutting campaign in Scotland, which has since been extended to London and the southeast, with the result that only about 70 percent of its total sale is now at the full rate of 35 pence.
News Group's directors also reported that advertising revenues were "slightly down" because there had been no major global sports events within the company's last financial year.
LE MONDE NOT PUBLISHED FOR TWO DAYS THIS WEEK DUE TO STRIKES
Staff at Le Monde, France's newspaper of record, voted on Wednesday to hold their second one-day strike in a week to protest plans to axe a quarter of the daily's journalists.
The Tocqueville Connection reported that the strike meant the debt-ridden afternoon paper was not published again yesterday.
It was missing from newsstands on Monday in an earlier protest at plans to cut 129 jobs, including up to 90 journalists, and sell several magazines in a bid to pull the Le Monde press group out of a financial crisis. Management has said it will resort to forced departures for the first time in the newspaper's history.
Another 170 jobs would be affected by the sale of two publishing houses, a cultural weekly and the La Procure religious publications.
Chief editor Eric Fottorino said this week that Monday's strike came during "serious and exceptional" times at the newspaper but vowed to press on with the proposed cuts to save the publication.
JAPANESE RADIO STATION TO BROADCAST 1955 EXECUTION TAPE
Reuters reports that a Japanese radio station will broadcast a 1955 tape of an execution in a special program next month, a rare move to raise public awareness as the government increases the frequency at which it hangs death row inmates.
The tape, from a prison in Osaka, western Japan, includes voices from the condemned prisoner and a prison guard, and the sound of the rope stretching when the inmate was hanged, said Katsuhiko Shimizu at Nippon Cultural Broadcasting Inc, a private radio station.
Educating the public about executions was becoming important before the start of a lay judge system next year in which citizens would help hand down verdicts and sentences for serious crimes together with professional judges, he said. T
The 55-minute program will also include interviews with prison guards, public prosecutors and journalists who have covered executions.
Japan executed four convicted murderers just last week.
Opinion polls show most Japanese support capital punishment although human rights groups such as Amnesty International condemn the practice. The government began revealing names and details of those hanged from December in a new policy aimed at bolstering support for executions.
Meanwhile the US is set to start executions again following a ruling that lethal injection was not humane even though it caused pain. One judge commented that it seems impossible to find a way of executing people without inflicting pain.
ITALIAN PUBLIC BROADCASTER COMES UP WITH TECHNOLOGY TO PROTECT VIEWERS FROM FOUL LANGUAGE
Media Network Weblog reports that an innovative research project will provide Italy’s public broadcaster RAI with a real time system to prevent offensive content reaching an unintended audience.
The experimental platform can detect any foul or obscene word from any broadcast, live or pre-recorded. The real-time application creates a small delay in the transmission process and allows the home user to activate a filter on his decoder.
Any offensive term to be replaced with a “beep” on the TV set.
The ability to remove foul and obscene language from broadcast content is seen to offer significant protection to a viewing and listening audience. The core technology is also being used in providing solutions for other markets. These range from real-time TV and radio news content for use in the financial services market to analysis work in call centres.
SPECULATION THAT AUSTRALIA’S FAIRFAX MEDIA WANTS A STAKE IN INDIA’S THE HINDU TIMES
The Western invasion of Indian media continues, this time with Australia trying to get a foothold into this lucrative and growing market.
Or so speculation goes.
The Australian newspaper yesterday ran with a story that Fairfax media wants in on India through a stake in the national English-language newspaper The Hindu.
Weekly magazine Business India and business daily Mint said Fairfax had been in discussions with The Hindu's owners, Kasturi & Sons.
Media analysts had valued the group at 26 billion to 28 billion rupees (A$700 million to $755 million), Mint said.
Fairfax spokesman Bruce Wolpe said the report was "entirely speculative".
Mint quoted Kasturi joint managing director N. Murali as saying: "These are speculations."
But the newspaper added: "Insiders close to Kasturi's shareholders and some media analysts said the discussions are indeed on, and the senior executives of the company, which also publishes The Hindu Business Line, have been visiting Australia at regular intervals."
Based in Chennai, The Hindu was founded 130 years ago and has been owned by the Kasturi family since 1905.
One of India's three national English-language papers, along with The Times of India and the Hindustan Times, it sells 1.2 million copies a day and has a readership of about four million.
MOBILE PHONE INTERNET SET TO COMMONPLACE IN AUSTRALIA NEXT YEAR SAY RESEARCHERS
The Australian reports that research shows that of mobile phone internet will be commonplace within a year.
The research, which is conducted annually by the University of Adelaide and mobile phone company m.Net as part of an international study, has found the proportion of people who have accessed a website on their phone has doubled to 40 percent in the past 12 months.
Sixty percent of people nominated improved mobile services and the reducing cost of accessing mobile internet content as a reason to change carriers, according to m.Net director of research Marisa Maio Mackay.
"Twelve to 18 months ago, it wasn't an influencing factor," Dr Maio Mackay said. "People were more concerned with the usability of the handset.
"For the first time we're starting to see the use of mobile data (or non-voice) services has reached a critical mass.”
But another study released this week by Sony Ericsson and 3 mobile found 91 percent of respondents did not use their phone to access the internet.
However, this study also found that 80 per cent of people would increase their mobile internet usage if the price were lowered.
AUSTRALIAN YOUTUBE VIDEO MAKERS NOW TO BE PAID FOR THEIR CREATIVE BRILLIANCE
YouTube film-makers in Australia will be able to make money with the expansion of the website's advertising program.
The Australian reports that the YouTubePartnerProgram, which provides money to YouTube content creators in exchange for displaying banner ads on their videos, was launched in Australia yesterday.
The program has been operating in the US and UK several months, with some participants earning thousands of dollars per month.
"It has certainly been an incentive for people to create more content," a YouTube Australia spokesman said.
The Australian reported that a select group of local YouTube producers have already signed up to the program, including AngryAussie and babyporridge.
Babyporridge, who has been contributing to YouTube since June 2007 and has more than 3,700 subscribers, says the key to success is interacting with your audience.
CANADIAN COMPANY BUYS PORTAL RIGHTS FOR INDIAN PREMIER LEAGUE CRICKET
Live Current Media, a Canada-based company has obtained the portal rights of the Indian Premier League for 10 years for US$50 million.
Live Current Media owns the domain Cricket.com, and intends to develop it as a portal around the Indian Premier League. An Indian company may also be involved with the portal.
Rafat Ali reports, “We believe that live streaming rights are not a part of the deal since those are being sold separately - Willow TV has got rights for streaming content in the Americas. $50 million for just the portal rights may seem high, but these are exclusive, and come at the cost of preventing other websites access to the Indian Premier League. As per reports, Live Current Media had recently rejected US$6 million offer for the domain Cricket.com.
Live Current Media, known earlier as Communicate.com, used to be a domain name company. They stopped selling their domain name portfolio, and began using the domains as commerce sites.
Around 90 percent of its revenue came from one e-commerce site - Perfume.com. The company owns 1100 domains, including Boxing.com, Brazil.com, Vietnam.com and importers.com, among others.
THE NATIONAL, ABU DHABI’S FIRST ENGLISH-LANGUAGE DAILY, LAUNCHES
ArabianBusiness.com reports that Abu Dhabi’s much vaunted first English-language daily The National hits United Arab Emirates newsstands yesterday.
Described by editor-in-chief Martin Newland as the country’s “first truly quality national and international newspaper,” the broadsheet launches with a 200-strong team of locally and internationally recruited journalists, with around 30 foreign correspondents.
Available throughout the Emirates and on flights in the region, it will be printed six days a week and feature 80 pages of national and international news.
The title is wholly owned by the Abu Dhabi Media Company, and is backed by the $850 million Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, the world’s biggest sovereign wealth fund.
Newland, former editor of the UK’s Daily Telegraph, said his priority, was to “create a quality daily that is very good in journalistic terms. Will I have problems with censorship? To be honest, I don’t know, and I suppose I’ll be finding out.”
The new daily will compete with English-language titles including Gulf News, Khaleej Times and Emirates Business 24/7.
THOMSON BUYS REUTERS, FORMS THOMSON REUTERS AND APPOINTS ASIA REGION MANAGING DIRECTOR
The Thomson Corporation moved quickly after completing its acquisition of Reuters Group yesterday, forming Thomson Reuters, by announcing the appointment of Michael Peace as managing director for Asia.
Peace will be based in Hong Kong.
Marketing magazine reports that Peace will lead the regional team across 19 countries in Asia and is tasked to drive growth, seek investment opportunities and develop talent.
He will also represent Asia on the operating committee of the new Thomson Reuters Markets organisation.
Prior to his present role, Peace was global head of the Reuters Research and Asset Management Division as well as ceo of Lipper, the mutual fund information subsidiary Reuters acquired in 1999.
The newly formed company also launched a new branding and a global advertising campaign today, according to Marketing magazine.
"The dynamic new corporate identity is a marked departure from the historical look and feel of the two companies and represents Thomson Reuters positioning as the world's leading source of intelligent information to businesses and professionals," Tom Glocer, ceo of Thomson Reuters, said.
TEMPORARY GOVERNMENT BAN HITS INDONESIA’S ASTRO PAY TV BROADCASTER HARD
Media Asia reports Indonesian authorities have lifted a temporary ban on Malaysian pay TV operator Astro Nusantara after four days.
Indonesia’s Department of Communications and Information had blocked broadcast due to “negligence” issues that included Astro’s failure to pay a US$20,000 fee for the use of certain frequency bands.
The ban was implemented on April 11, and stretched over the weekend to affect the broadcaster’s coverage of the Barclays Premier League and the International Golf Competition.
This cost the broadcaster up to $100,000 a day and is the latest hit to the cable brand’s Indonesian operations, which costs $6 million a month to upkeep.
Media Asia said that Direct Vision, which owns Astro Nusantara, had invested up to US$1 billion in 2006 to develop pay-TV in the country.
Astro Malaysia has a 20 per cent stake in Direct Vision and stands to lose up to $63 million should it decide to end its loss-generating venture in Indonesia.
NEWS INTERNATIONAL RUNS PRINT AD CAMPAIGN PROMOTING THE LONGEVITY OF NEWSPAPERS
News International in the UK has kicked off an ad campaign promoting not only its UK national newspapers, but the general longevity of the print newspaper industry.
FollowTheMedia reported that four full-page ads appeared in the April 11 edition of the UK’s Press Gazette trade weekly in an issue that devoted 24 pages to the winners of the British Press Awards contest – the edition sure to be read by all the UK news outlets themselves and many of the various ancillary organisations.
The ad concept was simple – show a fake front page of each of the newspapers for a date far into the future.
The tabloid Sun’s was June 10, 2038 and headlines that England finally won the soccer World Cup 72 years after its last such win in 1966.
Each ad in the lower right corner featured the headline, “Investing 650 million pounds in the future of newspapers” and the copy read simply, “We believe in the power of print. That’s why we just opened three next generation print plants to produce high quality full color newspapers. So tomorrow’s front pages are here today.”
The ad for The Times from March 5, 2043 headlines that London pedestrians will have to pay a congestion charge to walk in London.
For The Sunday Times of March 16, 2058, the headline is an “Outcry over Heathrow Terminal 17”. London’s Heathrow Airport recently disastrously opened its Terminal Five.
The tabloid Sunday News of the World the March 19, 2063 headline Tells of Amy “Winehouse In Meals-On-Wheels Bust Up.” The newspaper also promotes its “World Exclusive” of “Immortality Drug Discovered.”
FollowTheMedia reported, “All good fun but there is a serious message here. With all the doom and gloom stories facing newspapers today, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has made a huge investment in the future of print, at least in the UK. It has built three “shining cathedrals” to print, and the business plan calls for not only printing News International’s own titles but competitive titles, too. The fact the headlines are from so far in the future gives us the not-so-subtle message that these newspapers are going to be around for a long time to come.”
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